A/V Ramblings

Color Management

2011-01-25T08:44:00.002-05:00

Have you ever had to deal with faculty who tell you that current projectors do not match the resolution or color quality of 35mm slides? Do they still demand slide projectors in their classrooms, 8 years after Kodak stopped making them? Do they insist that ten years of technological advances still have not reached the quality of the classic slide projector? I hear this often from faculty I work with, and for the most part, they are correct.

Over the past few years higher resolution projectors at more affordable costs, have helped with delivering a better resolution. However, most institutions can not afford 15k projectors in every classroom. In talking with our faculty, the resolution is something that they have learned to live with. Certainly the convenience of digital images, along with the brightness of modern projectors have helped convince them in moving to the digital realm.

In my experience color rendering is a much bigger issue than resolution. In order to understand the issue better I recently took a walk around an academic building with a faculty member and looked at the same image on multiple screens and monitors. In fact, in every single room the image looked different. Suddenly I understood how difficult it is to teach fine details, such as how a specific artist puts golden glows around their main subjects, if that golden glow does not show up on every projector.

I dove into this problem headfirst determined to understand what was happening and learned a lot. My first stop was at the Imaging Center we have on campus to talk with our resident photo expert. He introduced me to the topic of Color Management. The basic concept of color management is simple, all colors have very specific definitions, and all computers agree on this definition. However, for various reasons (age, use, quality) the displays we connect our computers to don't all show these colors the same way. So, what we have to do is determine how "off" our displays are and have our computers adjust their output based on that number.

There are some fairly easy tools on the market to do this. We used a product call the "GretagMacbeth". The product contains a receiver that we set on a tripod and point at the screen. Then your computer, projecting on the screen, runs software that displays a series of known colors. The beamer determines how "off" these colors are, and develops a .icc profile for that display. This file tells your computer how it needs to compensate for the projector in color, brightness and contrast.

This ten minute process can dramatically correct color problems in your classrooms or presentation spaces. Our faculty loved the changes and are now more ready than ever to change over to digital. However, there are some problems and considerations. First, you need to remember that this process does not make an image look better, it makes the image look like it is supposed to look. Second, it is ideal to design systems so that the computer recognizes all attached displays. If you have rooms in which your computers feed into a matrix, switcher or splitter then it is likely that your computer does not know that it is plugged into multiple displays and you will not be able to set different profiles. Therefore, managing the color on the projector will make the local monitor colors wrong. In many cases this may be acceptable, as the lecturer or presenter knows how the image is supposed to look, and they are more concerned with the audience's experience. However, in a scenario where both need to be correct, or perhaps a room with multiple monitors of a different model, you will need to provide the ability for the computer to recognize all the displays. Due to the fact that you will be using your own .icc profile, full EDID information is not needed. All that is needed is recognition that the monitors are connected.

On a mac, these settings are extremely easy to use and very intuitive. When the mac sees a projector or other display, you can open the display preferences and get a separate set of preferences for the second display. Under the color tab of those preferences you can easily set the new profile. Under the settings for your second display, you can set a different profile. On the windows side, I have not found an easy solution for this. With Windows XP, you need to download an application, "Microsoft Color Control Panel Applet for Windows XP". Even with this application installed I was not successful in selecting separate profiles for the two separate displays. If anyone has had any luck with this application, please leave a comment and help the rest of us out.

A third issue to keep in mind is that displays experience color shifting over time. As lamps get older or heat alters the panel, there are slight changes in the color. For your pickiest user, you may need to do a re-calibration once a semester to ensure you have the most accurate colors possible. For some of the less picky faculty you may be able to use a single profile for one model of projector. The .icc profiles are cross platform, so this allow you to have a single profile that can be shared with multiple users, on multiple platforms, for a given space.

If you need a real upper, on a bad day, profile one of your classrooms then call in some of your art history faculty. You will put a smile on their face for sure. Going through this simple process is also a great way to continue to get the most out of your investment. It is an easy, yet very obvious way, to take your service to the next level.

Video Streaming and Time Lapse

2010-06-08T09:40:00.004-04:00

I was recently tasked with providing a live web feed of a construction process on campus. The customer also wanted to have a time lapse video of the project after it was completed. My first reaction was no problem, people do this all the time. After asking several colleagues about what they do, I realized there is not much of a standard out there for this type of project.

Most of the people I spoke with recommended Axis Network cameras. I researched several of these but ran into one major stumbling block. The built-in web servers would only serve 20 people at one time. While this may be suitable for security purposes, it seemed that this feed, at times, would get more than 20 viewers. I could imagine that many people are like me, and would open the web page in a tab, and then just leave it running, eating up one of our connections. My customer, and I, thought it was unacceptable to have people turned away. Next we looked at using a free service through the web, and ended up choosing Ustream. We connected a consumer level mini-DV camera to an out of service computer and started streaming. You can see the results here:

Bates College Garcelon Field Construction Feed

For several weeks this has provided us a reliable streaming service. As an added bonus to our web people, it also provides metrics. Our customer has been very happy with the result, and we have heard from people who view the stream and they love it.

The time lapse portion of the project also required some research. Our intial thinking is that we would store all the video, stick it into Final Cut Pro, and speed it up. We quickly learned that even though this is a short construction project (5 months) saving all that video would take too much space. We also did not think we had the processing power to create the final video.

We did some research on various cameras, but learned that most of them that did time lapse saved it as a QT video. We did not want to work with video that a Point and Shoot camera had compressed. Finally, we learned that Canon cameras come with a piece of software that manages the camera and activates the shutter on a schedule defined by the user. This software is only available on the higher end Canons. We purchased a Rebel XS, on sale for $500. If you go this route, you will also want to purchase a power supply for the camera. I forgot this step and had to scramble to get one when I realized the camera was not powered by USB from the computer. We have done a few tests of the time lapse, again with great results. Look back here in October and I will post a link to the final time lapse, along with a final critique of how this project went.

Rooms That Talk

2010-05-07T15:23:00.011-04:00

If you would like to see this whole presentation, in better detail, follow this link:

http://www.screencast.com/t/NjQ4Mjg2

blogger.com makes it really hard to embed regular sized video.

Home Built Control Systems?

2010-05-05T14:37:00.006-04:00

In early May I attended a NERCOMP conference hosted by UMass Amherst. A group from Wesleyan University presented what they are calling RoomTrol. It is a control system that they have developed in-house with student programming. The system has a web (Java) interface, and you can use any touchpanel with a USB connection. The control system is a mini-computer (like a mac mini, but a PC) and is running linux. For RS-232 ports and IR ports they use USB-RS232 or USB-IR conversion cables. The input from the touch panel to the "control system" is USB. The group reported that the entire "control system" and touch panel cost them under $1,000. That is a significant savings from what we are used to. If you buy a similar product commercially, you are going to spend around $5,000 for a control system and touch panel. Also, they are using the switching functions built into their projector. So they have no need for other switchers, again another saving. They have had this system in pilot mode for one year in a room, and over the summer plan to deploy it to three spaces. This initial deploy will cost $12,000 less than other installs.

You may be interested to know that this University has a very interesting system of supporting rooms. In fact, all the support is done by student staff. The entire design and programming for this new system has also been done by students. So, here again they are saving money by not having their professional staff creating this system.

I was excited at the potential cost saving, but left wondering if they really know what they are getting into. Obviously, someone is writing the drivers for this system. What do they do every time they have a different model projector, LCD panel or IR device. How much time is spent writing the modules for these? And, even with student labor, is it worth the saving? What about when things simply don't work? Do they have the time to do the troubleshooting on a home grown system? Finally, what about all the things that professional systems provide that this system does not? In my programming, I use video sync info from the processor, I use touch panel activity indicators and all type of other useful tools that are provided to me. How much time would it take to have someone program all of this? Finally, I will be the first to admit that when all heck breaks loose, I like having someone (a company) to point a finger at. Who does the finger get pointed at, when you created the system?

When I thought more about this on my 4 hour drive home, I began to wonder if I just saw the first ripple in a tidal wave coming at the A/V industry. What Wesleyan is really doing, is creating open source control systems. Is there a future in this? Would having support networks in place, like those that exist for moodle, sakai and others applications answer my questions? Certainly, the questions I have posed are the exact questions my school (and many, many others) have asked and answered before switching from a commercial product, like BlackBoard, to an open source one, like Moodle.

What do you think? Have you ever considered such a revolution? Is it possible that in five years a system like Wesleyan is building could be common place in our "hang and bang" classrooms? Or, is this a project that works very well for one institution, but will not be easy to replicate at others? Leave a comment and let me know what you think.

Thoughts from a weekend emergency

2010-02-03T09:05:00.003-05:00

This weekend there was an event on campus that involved a presenter bringing their own laptop. I got a panicked call on Saturday night, because it was not working. Luckily, I was only minutes away from campus, so I was able to stop by and see what was going on. The VGA input for the laptop had been damaged by a previous user and therefore was not working. As I scrambled to find a solution, a couple thoughts came to mind.

1. On the inside of every rack should be a schematic drawing. In an emergency trying to trace back a wire, without a schematic gets to be very stressful. Having a schematic would have allowed me to relax a bit and have the time to work through the rack properly. I imagine that I am one of the last people to think of this, but better late than never!

2. Is all the Cat5 we are using for installations really an advancement? On Saturday, my saving grace was disconnecting the VGA from the rack, at the wall plate and plugging the laptop in there. In all of our new installations, this connection would not have existed. All that would be at the wall plate was a Cat5. I could try all night, but I don't think I could have plugged the VGA into the Cat5. While these installations are certainly easier to install and design, they also take away a lot of our learned experiences on how solve problems in emergencies!

Can AV Managers Learn from their IT Counterparts?

2010-01-28T22:26:00.000-05:00

A/V technology has rapidly changed over the past several years. The technical changes have been blazing fast and demands from our users grow at an almost equal pace. In the education world, A/V shops have transformed from staff who push around A/V carts to highly trained technicians, system designers and programmers. Despite these changes our basic charge has stayed the same, "provide the technology that I need and make sure it works when I need it". Many technology managers feel immense pressure to somehow manage all of this change, manage the exponential growth in equipment on our campuses and provide the same level of service that we did when we had more staff and less equipment. Bates College, for example, has experienced a 400% growth in A/V equipment and installations over the past 6 years, while losing one full time position. Unfortunately, many of the leaders of our institutions are unaware of how quickly A/V has evolved and still view the position in A/V departments as low skilled. At this critical point in the growth and importance of A/V in our institutions we can learn a tremendous amount from our colleagues in IT. After all, they went through, and continue to go through, similar changes with computing. Don't forget there was a time when the IT group was considered the "techies" whose only charge was to keep the computers working. Rightfully so, IT now has a role in almost all aspects of campus life.

At Bates College we have moved towards a model that borrows from the IT structure. Our first and most significant step towards this transition has been developing statistics on usage and problems. Talk to your IT guys, they can tell you how many e-mails come into campus on a day, how many help desk calls were made during a given time period, how many computers exist on the campus and they use this information to gain support for their work. At Bates, we are using Crestron RoomView for our reporting needs and the results have been phenomenal. Every month I am able to report detailed statistics to my staff, administration and faculty about A/V use on campus. Frankly, the usage blows us all away and makes us realize A/V is in constant use and is remarkably reliable. We currently have 50 classrooms on campus with full A/V installations. In those 50 rooms the A/V systems were used over 5,000 unique times in the fall semester of 2009. We had a total of 70 trouble calls during the first semester that were technical problems, resulting in a 98.9% success rate of technology in our classrooms. I don't want to lessen the importance and significance of the 15 problems, any time there is a problem it is serious, but I also use this data to point out to our administration the incredible job that is being done in keeping the equipment running. Compare this to what goes on in the IT side. If your CIO got 15 e-mails a month from people complaining about computing problems (and he/she probably does) they would simply chalk it up the fact that technology does not always work the way users expect it to, realizing that 15 calls is a pretty small number considering the usage of the network and computers. However, 15 e-mails to that same CIO about classroom technology problems would probably raise a "why does this stuff never work" response. If your CIO has this response, but has no frame of reference for the complaints, then what other reaction could be expected? You have to provide the data on a regular basis whether they ask for it or not. If done right, this data should be readily available for you to provide to your superiors without much of a time commitment on your part.

Another issue we grapple with on a regular basis is user support. For so long our mode of operation has been to drop everything, run to a problem and do anything you possibly can to fix the problem. I believe this can be traced back to the early days of classroom technology in which the equipment was a mix match of various technologies, much of which was custom built, and frankly, did not work consistently. Clearly, the technology has gotten to a level where this is not as much of a problem. Equipment is more reliable and many of our users are more comfortable with the equipment. However, there are still some problems that occur and training still needs to happen. Again, I suggest we look to IT to see what they have done that is successful and borrow what works. Most of us have borrowed the idea of a help desk from the IT side. I don't know of any institutions that don't have some form of an A/V help desk. How about classroom troubleshooting? What does a person do after hours when they can't get their laptop to work or there is no sound from the computer? Many institutions I have talked with either have no support for this type of situation, or they have paper printed and put in the classrooms. When was the last time you saw your IT department give a manual to a person when they delivered them a computer? They don't, instead they use the tools at their disposal, namely, helpsheets on the web. Use the same resource, or better yet, use the resource that may already be in the room, namely the touchpanel. In our classrooms, our touchpanels themselves are the troubleshooting tools. They tell the user whether the laptop is outputting a signal, and if not give the user the option of reading steps on how to ouput video from their laptop. Using current sensors we can detail some simple troubleshooting, such as whether the dedicated computer or the document camera is on, yes, we too get calls from people saying something didn't work only to find they had not turned it on. If someone presses the help button to report that there is no sound from the computer, the touchpanel shows instructions to check the volume on the computer, as well as the volume level on the touchpanel.

There has been a lot of talk on the A/V channels over the past few months about the digital transition and the host of problems that come with these changes. Particularly, how do we deal with super-high resolutions and connection types that are not standard in the classroom (i.e. HDMI, DisplayPort). While well intentioned, some people jump to conclusions like, let's have an emergency kit of every adapter type in every classroom. Again, that feeling of "we must make anything work" stirs in us. Yet, we know that we can not possibly achieve this goal and trying to will only result in more failure. A pile of adapters looks very messy, they will disappear and likely the users won't know how to use them. By making all these adapters available, you would be declaring support for all of them. We followed the lead of our IT department in this area as well. IT has a very clear list of software that is supported by the college. For example, we support Microsoft Word. If you choose to use Google Docs, Open Office or some other word processing application, the help desk will not support you. In the A/V group we published a list of supported input types (DVI, VGA, etc.) along with supported resolutions (XGA, WXGA). When someone brings a visitor to campus, we point them to this document and let them know what we support.

Finally, the last big thing we can learn from IT is about budgeting. This is a sensitive issue at the moment because everyone is getting their budgets slashed. However, I believe that IT does a very good job of letting people know exactly what it means to cut parts of their budget. Our network folks make very clear that cutting the preventative maintenance budget means they will not be able to replace switches and servers, and that it WILL result in more down time. Our desktop folks make it very clear that stretching out the desktop replacement cycle would mean that you end up with machines that are not under warranty, creating more work and costing more money. If the budgets in this area are cut, and there are failures, again, the network and desktop people do not "take the fall", and rightfully so, they point out that the failures are a direct result of budget cuts. Are we explaining very well what it means to skip a year on the replacement cycle for displays or control systems? Have you talked with your CIO about the change to digital interfaces that is well underway? Do they understand clearly that not replacing projectors and internal A/V system parts, that they will not be compatible with say, DVI or HDMI? Do you take it a step further and show them how this will affect faculty, staff and visiting presenters? If not, then it makes perfect sense that they cut your budget when the fiscal knife comes out. There are many resources available to provide you with data on the transition to digital. Use these resources to learn about these changes and talk with your superiors about why the equipment needs to be part of a regular replacement cycle. As technology managers, it is our responsibility to educate people in our organizations about the technical changes that have taken place in the industry and the correlation to change in job skills, responsibilities and fiscal support needed to provide reliable A/V on our campuses.

The IT guys did this years ago, now it is our turn.

Lecture Capture - Why So Expensive

2010-01-18T19:26:00.000-05:00

Over the past year or so, I have been investigating Classroom Capture systems. There are some great systems out there, but they are SO expensive. I truly don't understand why. Sure, there are some systems that are free, and others that are not incredibly expensive but require LOTS of configuration and in-house programming. And most of those systems require some work by the professor to get them running.

I guess that the other systems are so expensive because the market will bear the cost, but I wonder why. How can it make sense to pay $10k or more for one of these systems. Ok, ok, I know why it makes sense to pay that much money, it makes sense if you are turning around and making a profit off the recordings that are made.

What about the rest of us? What about those of use who want a system that fits the following requirements:
- no software on the computer, recording is done via an inline box
- simple to use
- no more that 1 day of server install time
- less than 5k per unit
- NO recurring software costs? Why should I pay for something I already own!!!!!

Beyond the blatant (and powerful) use of this technology as a way to review class sessions there are so many other uses that smaller colleges, like the one I work at could explore. Here are some examples:
- pre- lecture modules: a professor puts up a recording of a particularly difficult subject, from the previous year's lecture and lets students review it before coming to the current year's lecture.
- learning modules: a professor records himself/herself lecturing on a specific topic, with examples, and posts it in the school's LMS.
- learning differences. There are so many examples here. Students who have learning differences have oppurtinities to focus in class, without taking detailed notes, knowing they can review the lecture later.
- students with illness: During the recent swine flu outbreak, we learned that the best way to avoid illness is to stay away from others when we are sick. Serious students may have a hard time not coming to class. They may be more willing to stay home and get well, knowing that the lecture would be captured.

Because these examples don't bring in revenue, there is no way a small college can make this technology widespread at current costs of the equipment. Plus, what is so complicated about this technology that makes it so expensive? They are essentially computers, with a piece of software on them.

There is a big market out there for someone who figures this out and sells the product at a reaonsable price. When that happens, I hope they call me first!

2010 - Is it the year you WILL deal with HDCP?

2010-01-04T13:41:00.000-05:00

High-bandwidth Digital Content Protection (HDCP) has been around for a few years, but many Technology Managers have not had to deal with it. Will 2010 be the year that you finally have no choice but to understand HDCP and install compatible devices? We are at a time of year for predictions and resolutions. I have one of each. I predict this is the year that you will have to deal with HDCP in some way, and I suggest we all make learning about HDCP our resolution.

First, let's quickly recap HDCP. HDCP is a form of digital copy protection. Watered down, it essentially is a communication protocol, based on keys, between a video source (i.e. Blu-Ray player) and a display device (i.e. LCD projector or TV) often referred to as a sink. The source is in constant (multiple times per second) contact with the sink to ensure that nothing has been placed in line between the two devices. Essentially the source says "are you a display device that does not record" and the device responds, "yes, I am". In home installations this is a pretty smooth setup with minimum problems because most people have a direct connection from their Blu-Ray player to the their display.

It becomes more complicated in commercial or educational environments. For starters, we often have multiple sources, going to a single, or multiple displays. This requires us to put a device in that manages the HDCP keys and lets the system know that it is allowed to pass the video. So, we look at something more along the lines of a source, confirming with a video extender, that is is an extender and only an extender, and it is connected to only a display device. Obviously, there is more to the technology than this limited post can supply, but this is the basic idea.

The concern for technology managers is not just the Blu-Ray player. I think we all need to be concerned about the "other" devices that we don't think of as needing HDCP support. For example, for over a year Apple laptops have enforced HDCP restrictions on some HD movies downloaded from iTunes. So, if it was common practice for a professor to show a movie from his/her laptop in class, they are going to have problems with the newer movies.

Our school has a student run filmboard. The board gets films that are out of theaters, but not yet available on DVD. Currently, the company they deal with sends VHS tapes (seriously) of these movies. I guess they figure that no one would want to copy it! However, they are pushing to have schools purchase an online device that downloads the movie from their servers (think NetFlix On Demand). However, this device requires HDCP compatability at the projector, which we don't have in this space.

In our academic worlds HDCP may be an excellent way for academics to protect their intellectual property and companies to be sure you are not stealing from them. On occasion, we have presenters come to campus who do not want their presentations recorded. I think it would be a fair assumption that Microsoft will soon incorporate a feature that allows you to turn on HDCP protection for any video coming out of your laptop. Unless you have systems prepared to handle this, you may be stuck with a presenter who will not show their presentation. What about applications such as ArtStor or Naxos music server? Will they begin to incorporate HDCP requirements into their systems to protect copyrights? What about your classroom capture equipment? Have you considered how HDCP will affect it? What about our faculty who dutifully subscribe to fair use regulations? HDCP has killed our ability to take clips out of movies.

The change to digital systems has been a challenge for Technology Managers, but I believe the impact of HDCP is what is going to really force us to re-think our installs, and soon. We have been converting DVI to VGA for years, with no clear loss of image quality. However, as HDCP is now standard in our video out connections (HDMI, DisplayPort) that will no longer be an option, we will have to move our installs to support HDCP. This is about more than just wires and infrastructure. We need to be thinking about the devices we are installing as well. If you hang a projector this summer that does not have a digital input with HDCP, then you will be replacing it sooner than expected.

I have found a few resources for learning more about HDCP - Feel free to leave comments if you know of additional resources:

- Wikipedia HDCP - http://bit.ly/WikiHDCP
- Detailed Specs for the really techno-savy http://bit.ly/hdcpttp
- Extron White Paper on HDCP - http://www.extron.com/download/files/whitepaper/hdcp_wp.pdf

Setting Expectations, Part 2: What are the User's Responsibility in A/V?

2009-12-22T09:37:00.002-05:00

In my last blog post I questioned what reasonable expectations are for the reliability of AV systems. This time I am considering reasonable expectations of people who use these systems. Specifically, how much should people be expected to know about an A/V system?

I have previously discussed the not so distant past of A/V, and how we are still trying to get beyond the "reputation". In particular, for a long time A/V was not professionally integrated in our spaces and frankly, did not work very well. The behind the scenes AV was not close to the systems we have today and it was confusing to use. Remember, it was not that long ago that a professor may have used a mixing board to increase volume in the classroom! AV techs NEEDED to be available to help run this equipment. Clearly, with the saturation and usage rates of equipment, this is no longer possible. We simply can not be everywhere anymore.

At Bates College we have begun to change support expectations. The first step in this process is to develop systems that are easy to use, reliable and well maintained. For example, if you have touchpanels, you should seriously consider using Dashboard for Controls. Choosing a standard like this helps your staff, my staff and all the presenters who travel from one location to another.

One test that I have used to determine how simple a room is to use, is to bring someone in who has never used a control device before. I point them to the touchpanel or button pad and ask them to turn the projector on and select the dedicated computer. If they can not do that, then the system is not easy enough to use. As a side note, I am looking for more people to be my test users, so far my wife, brother and father have all been used. Would enlisting my 8 year old daughter be wrong?

After we were comfortable that our systems were easy to use and reliable we started offering training (during regular work hours) as opposed to on-site support during usage of the system. At Bates we believe that the money we spend on touchpanels is returned by not requiring technicians at every event. If you are going to send an AV tech to press the two buttons on a touchpanel, then why did you put in the touchpanel to begin with?

At first our users worried about us not being at every event. They were worried about their presentation failing, and that makes sense, it is a fear that all presenters have. However, after several successful events (507 events in the fall semester, with 2 reported problems) the users realized they can use the systems on their own. By the way, the two reported problems turned out to be matters of convenience, neither stopped the presentation from moving forward.

Under the right conditions, I will sometimes joke with a nervous presenter and remind them that the A/V system in the room is much easier to use than a photocopier, fax machine and their cell phone (and likely more reliable than any of those) and they manage to use them everyday. We developed these changes as policy and posted so all our clients could have access to them.

Our second struggle is with outside presenters. Too many times we have seen problems with presentations because no expectations or responsibilities were made clear in advance. Presenters show up with all types of various computers, media and peripherals. We have had events in which we were told no AV was being used, and the presenter showed up with a laptop that had a proprietary video output, and they did not have the adapter. Because no expectations were set in advance, solving this problem became the responsibility of the AV staff. Of course, we did not have the adapter, so the presenter could not use their laptop. While this unfairly made the AV staff look bad, more importantly, the event did not go off as well as it could have and should have.

After a couple of these occurrences, we set expectations and responsibilities. We made it clear that outside speakers have responsibilities to know how to use their own technology. We went around campus talking with people who sponsor outside speakers and made sure they were aware of our new policy. As current practice we send the previous link to everyone who is a guest speaker at the College. Again, this was a change and people were not fully comfortable with the change, but after a full semester, it is clear (the aforementioned 507 successful events) that the policy has made events flow more smoothly.

The point we try to get across to users of the system is that our responsibilities include providing you with reliable, easy to use rooms and training on how the rooms work. Your responsibilities include taking the time to learn how the system works, and only bringing your own devices if you know how they work.

Dragon Dication: May make you do something you are not used to...

2009-12-21T08:53:00.000-05:00

After reading David Pogue's glowing recommendation of Dragon Dication, I decided I needed to download it. I installed it on my phone and started playing immediately. I was confused at first, it did not seem very accurate. For example, I dictated a message to my wife, "Hey, if you remember to stop at the Y and pay the bill, I can pick up some groceries on the way home." What I got was, "Hey I do remember to stop at the Y. and pay the bill I might come get some groceries on the way home."

Hmmm she would get the point of the message, but likely question whether I really did go to college. After playing some more I began to realize the problem...I had not thought about what I wanted the message to say. If I was going to call my wife and give her the message, or send her an e-mail, text or even voice mail I could compose the message on the fly. Yet, if I wanted to dictate the message, and have it converted to text, I had to THINK in advance of what I wanted to say.

I don't think composing an e-mail or text message on the fly is a bad thing. Composing at the keyboard is fine, because you have time to re-read and/or edit before sending. I think it is how most people in the thirty something generation tend to work. However, with Dragon Dictation, that just does not work. If you need to go through your message to fix all the errors, it may be easier to just type in. I think I will be using the application for short, well thought out text messages, e-mail and twitter updates, but nothing more than a couple of sentences.

Setting Expectations, Part 1: What are reasonable realiability expectations of an A/V system?

2009-12-07T12:37:00.000-05:00

Setting Expectations, Part One:

What are reasonable expectations for the reliability of an A/V system?

Bates College has been keeping careful track of the usage of our A/V systems, including failure rates, for the past several months. The results of this exercise have been intriguing. In particular, I was surprised at the reliability of our A/V systems. Over the first three months of classes this year, we have had 4,285 individual uses of A/V technologies in our classroom, with 42 reported technical problems. That is slightly better than a 99% success rate of the systems. While that makes me want to scream success from the rooftops, I can not ignore the fact that there were still 42 times that that the technology did not work. If you happened to be the presenter or instructor one of those 42 times, then the 99% success rate does not impress you very much. After all, it did not work when you needed it!!!

This leads me to one of those rare moments for me when I go back and forth on how I feel about an issue. As a technical person, who understands that sometimes technology fails, and that it's nobody's fault, I think that a 99% success rate is remarkable. Yet, as a person who has given presentations and taught classes, I understand the devastation of having your hour plus talk threatened by failing technology.

In environments like colleges and corporate settings, where there are multiple rooms with A/V that are used very regularly, what are reasonable expectations of the reliability of an A/V system? I think that the expectations will be different for every institution with budget and staffing playing a role in setting expectations. However, here are some thoughts to keep in mind while thinking about expectations:

1. Electronic equipment will fail at some point. So, unless you are willing to install redundant systems in every space, then you have to accept some rate of failure.

2. You have to look at hard data not empirical data. You can not let the person who yelled the loudest when something broke cloud your judgment. You need to develop a tough skin and remember that when A/V fails, it has the potential to ruin an event and make the presenter/lecturer very upset. Therefore, just because six people called your boss over the past six months to scream about A/V not working, does not mean that campus-wide, A/V does not work.

3. If AV and IT have integrated on your campus, leverage that partnership. Talk to end users to help them realize that A/V is IT. Reasonable users recognize that their computers will sometimes malfunction, that is why there is a help desk. They also realize that sometimes the network will have hiccups, phones won't work perfectly, etc. Talk to your IT colleagues about how they set user expectations.

4. Be very open about failures and your plans on how to avoid them or fix them if they happen. Just like a power supply that dies in a computer is not the fault of the computer tech, a power supply in a projector that dies is not the fault of the A/V tech. We should not hide that this has happened, but be very clear about what has happened and how you are prepared to repair or replace quickly.

5. Finally, be very clear about what the costs of higher expectations are to your organization. If more preventative maintenance is required to lower the numbers of failures, then that costs staff time. If you are expected to have hot swaps on hand, then that costs money to purchase the extra equipment. You have to make sure your organization is being realistic in terms of budgeting when setting these expectations.

When this work has been done, make sure that you talk publicly and regularly about expectations, and the reward for this work will be realized. You will have bosses who look at failures as rare occurrences, rather than as regular occurrences. You and your bosses will have actual data to share with presenters/instructors when they experience a failure. Last, but far from least, you will have the satisfaction of knowing the expectations of your campus, and being able to meet those expectations.

Next time, Setting Expectations, Part 2: What are reasonable expectations of end users of A/V systems?

Skype in the classroom - Good Enough?

2009-11-24T11:06:00.000-05:00

We recently had a very sucesfull class usage of Skype. A professor brought in a guest speaker. This speaker would not have been part of the class if they had to travel to campus. The Skype conference went flawlessly, but not without effort. We did a few trial calls and our network group graciously took the time to dedicate bandwidth to this call. The professor was happy, and word spread, soon we had another request for using Skype, this time for some interviews with off campus folks. This time the calls were not quite as flawless. Because several people were being called, we could not dedicate bandwidth to each connection. The result was that the video froze, audio fell out, all the things that can happen with this type of call. They decided to drop the skype connection and just go to the conference phone. In a classroom, a conference phone would not have been an option. It left me a little less excited about using skype in the classroom. No matter how prepared I make a faculty member for the idea that skype could fail, if it actually fails it is still a problem. After all, the faculty member has planned part (or all) of their class around this, so my inability to give them any re-assurance that Skype will work, leads me to recommend they not use it. As much effort as we all put in to make this sucesfull, it just is not possible to do this work for every possible instance of when and where people may want to use skype. In my opinion, in the classroom, Skype is just not good enough.

Should Tech Managers Still Be Staging Events?

2009-11-20T09:03:00.000-05:00

Last week I wrote about our experiences at Bates College with internal installs. It is clear to me that Tech Managers should be doing internal installs. What about some of the other things that we have always done, should we still do them, does it still make sense? The second biggest part of any Media Services division at a college, after classroom support, has always been Event Support. In fact, in some departments, like ours at Bates, Event Support is part of the title of the department. What does event support entail? For, years at Bates it meant providing any and all A/V that any possible presentation on campus would need. Need sound and video in the Field House for an advancement dinner, done. Need to do an outside "drive-in movie", done. Of course, by done, I mean done as well as we could do it. Putting up sound and video in a field house for a 600 person dinner, is in fact, a time consuming task. It took three employees a full day to setup, test and tear down the equipment. It took two employees 4-5 hours to be at the event running the equipment. Every piece of movable equipment we owned was being used at the event. If any of that equipment had failed, we would not have been able to provide a spare. The equipment we used was good quality, but not really right for the space. This experience was repeated 5-6 times every year. Usually, the response from attendees was that the event went well, but there were always a few valid complaints. The projector was not bright enough, there were not enough speakers in the room, etc.

We took a look at what we were doing with event support and came to some conclusions:
1. It takes a lot of man hours to properly pull off a staged event
2. It takes good quality equipment and backups to that equipment to properly pull off a staged event
3. Staging events is as much art as it is science, and people who only do it 5-10 times per year do not have enough practice.
4. Buying the right equipment did not make financial sense. How can we justify purchasing a $15,000 projector, that will only get used 5 times a year. After getting used 15-20 times we would need to replace it because it would be obsolete.
5. Internally supporting these events provided NO LONG TERM benefit to the college. The only possible benefit is cost savings, but that is questionable, comes at the expense of a sub-par event.

Cost is questionable because you need to truly consider what it costs to put these events on in-house. You need to not only count man hours to stage and run the event, but you need to consider what those man hours are NOT doing. Who is supporting your classrooms when the entire staff is staging an event? You also need to consider costs for equipment. Projectors, screens, speakers and sound systems all need to be repaired and replaced over time. This needs to be part of your calculations.

We now have a policy that states that all events that take place in a space with no built-in A/V will be outsourced. The year that we implemented this policy we were able to cut $15,000 from the A/V budget. This was money that we had budgeted for repair and replacement of event support equipment. The result of this new policy, is that event planners know what to expect, what is possible and the events are staged and run by professionals who do this every day of their work lives.

Should A/V Tech Managers Do Installs Internally?

2009-11-13T14:53:00.000-05:00

Two years ago Bates College began completing their basic classroom installs with internal staffing. While we are not alone in this, there is some question in the industry as to whether this is the right thing to do. I worked with an integrator for a while who swore up and down this was the wrong thing to do. He gave reasons like we were not insured to hang projectors, screens, speakers, etc. We could not get the same type of technical support, and did not have the resources for programming and design. Why would we want to waste our time, when we have "more important things to do".

Some pretty clear answers to these objections have developed over the years. First, our Physical Plant department hangs the equipment, so they are insured by the college. All the "big" companies now offer free technical support to tech managers in the educational field. Crestron Electronics, even goes a step further, they offer design services to their customers. Combine this with the wealth of training that is available from the manufacturers, or from the many sessions at tradeshows, such as InfoComm and tech managers can get training that rivals anything available to commercial installers and integrators.

So, the big question is about the time. Is doing an install truly a waste of our time? Do we have other, more important things to do. To answer that I look at what my department has done over the past year. This past summer, we installed 6 new classrooms. Equipment for each room totaled $15,000. These rooms are top level rooms equipped with projectors, touchpanels, control systems, doc cams, sympodiums, computers and sound system. We spent about $2,000 on electricians running wire and installing power. The money for electrical work would have been spent, regardless of whether we installed the room or an external installer had done the work. If we had hired our favorite integrator to install the rooms, we would have spent at least $30,000 per room. This means that we saved $90,000 by completing these installs internally. We literally saved enough money to install 6 more classrooms, or better yet, more than enough to hire an experienced and competent A/V tech! Another example is an executive boardroom we installed. A quote for this room last year came in at $50,000. We completed the install for $19,000. We saved the college $31,000! The other "important" work that we could be doing during this time would be wheeling A/V carts around campus. Yet, this summer we were able to finish our goal of having A/V installed in every classroom. That means no more wheeling carts around.

For Tech Managers in the education field, this means you really need to consider completing installs internally. For integrators, it means you need to think about your business models. As the bigger companies like Crestron and Extron make it easier and easier for technology managers to complete their own installs, you are going to have to find a way to make money with service.

Classroom A/V Not Sustainable?

2009-11-03T11:36:00.000-05:00

I have read several posts on the social sites lately about how A/V technology on our campuses is not sustainable. I am having a hard time wrapping my head around that one. I never remember hearing that our network was unsustainable or that our telephone system was unsustainable. Sure, I have heard talk about ways to cut costs, but just ruling it too expensive, of course not.

I think we need to look at the technologies in our classrooms and meeting rooms the same way we look at our IT infrastructure and equipment. At Bates College, I don't make the argument that we need to spend on A/V, I let the room usage make the argument for me. During the first two months of classes this year, A/V has been used over 2,900 times in 50 classrooms. That averages out to 83 times per day! About 1/3 of those uses, were in rooms that had no technology installs two years ago. Clearly, faculty are using the technology, A LOT, and are quickly adapting to new installs. I give these statistics to the people who make the budget decisions. It is very clear that not funding new installs will keep faculty from teaching in the manner that they have become accustomed to. Our stats clearly tell us that if we had not funded new installs over the past two years, there would have been over 1,000 times, in two months, that faculty would have needed technology that was not available!

I also give the administration information about why upgrades and replacements are necessary. For the foreseeable future, this means pointing out all the changes that are part of the digital transition. We have faculty asking about being able to play BluRay DVD's, connecting laptops with only DVI connections (or worse only HDMI connections). Again, I keep totals on these types of requests and present them to those who make the budget decisions. In my view, this may actually be a time when we have an easy argument for maintenance and repair budgets. If you can give a clear explanation to your CIO, and other decision makers, about HDMI, DVI, DisplayPort and HDCP and how only a truly integrated system will allow these technologies to work, then a decision not to fund these changes is at least an educated one. They will know that problems will be created by this lack of funding. Moving forward from that decision any classroom problems or event problems that can be directly related to lack of repair and replacement need to be forwarded to the decision makers, and not "explained away" as a technical problem.

Don't get me wrong, I realize that budgets are extraordinarily tight, and we all need to tighten our belts. However, as Tech Managers, pretending that budget cuts are easily handled, or readily accepting the thought that A/V is not sustainable does not do your office, your faculty or your institution justice. We end up putting together systems that are not integrated and don't work very well. We get ourselves caught in a seemingly endless, "why should we give A/V more money, when nothing ever works" versus "nothing ever works because we don't have the budget to do it right". The ony way to break this cycle, make sure that your administration is hearing (along with detailed stastics and education) the "we don't have the budget to do it right" side of the argument.

A/V - IT Integration Scary for Business

2009-11-02T13:10:00.001-05:00

Traditional A/V companies are feeling very threatened by much of the activity that in going on as part of the A/V-IT convergence. Not helpful to this fear, is the recent decision by Crestron to partner with Dell and sell product through Dell. Also, brought to light is the fact that CDW already carries a pretty full line of Crestron product. There seems to be a feeling of "what is the small A/V business to do".

Although I am considered by the industry to be an "end-user" it seems pretty simple to me what these companies need to do. They need to expand their lines and partner with IT companies. If I owned a small to medium sized A/V company today, I would be on the phone with all the IT companies within a 1oo mile radius. I would be trying to strike up some partnerships and figure out how we will not drive each other out of business. Think of the partnership similar to the Independent Programmer/Integrator partnership. Both of the parties in those relationships recognize the expertise of the other, don't have to carry the overhead of extra employees and seem to be doing very well.

The other fear I hear all the time is "these guys don't know what they are doing" in reference to IT guys doing A/V installs. My question, if that is true, why do you care? If IT guys go in and screw up an A/V install, then who is going to get the call to fix it? You are! Then guess what, you get to make money in the only area left to make money: SERVICE.

Welcome

2007-03-09T09:18:00.001-05:00

Welcome to A/V Ramblings. This is a blog, created by me, Scott Tiner, to talk about news in the A/V industry as I see it. I currently manage the complete A/V systems in a liberal arts college in Maine. The job includes specifying equipment, designing systems, installing systems, programming systems, and working with vendors and integrators. I thought it would be interesting to provide a source of information for others that are out there who do similar work, whether it be in an education environment, hotel, business, whatever. Many of us in this business are voracious consumers of information. We want to know about stuff, how it works, what the future is, what does it look like, has anyone else seen this in action. So, I will not purport to be an expert in everything, but hopefully this will be a place to put links to other sites and sources of information. Of course, I will often give my own opinion on things that affect the industry.

I hope you enjoy the site and visit often.

Scott